 |
 |
|
Summary:
Tuula Okkonen, Democratization of
Japan versus Modern Failures
According to the common understanding, the occupation of the post-war
Japan is a unique example. The demilitarization and democratization of
the country was very successful. In a few years the country, which had
violated all conventions of peace and war, turned into a peaceful
nation. The militaristic and ultra-nationalistic past was cast away
and the subjects of the emperor were re-orientated into citizens of
the modern society by the United States.
In our decade, the fight for human rights,
equality and democracy has not been a success. US-led coalition
occupying Afghanistan and Iraq is in difficulties in its tasks of
demilitarization and democratization. It seems evident that lessons
learned in Japan were forgotten.
Japan-expert and historian John W. Dower
warned in October 2002 in New York Times that the occupation of Japan
provides a clear warning instead of a model. Rushing to war without
imagining all its consequences is a signal of terrible hubris. The
occupation of Japan had legal legitimacy in the eyes of almost all
Japanese and the rest of the world, it was based on long
interdepartmental deliberation in Washington, and the reform policy
was implemented with the Japanese bureaucracy. According to Dower, it
was difficult to imagine post-war Iraq in which reforms were carried
out with the structures of the old regime. Also Iokibe Makoto,
occupation of Japan specialist, reminded in Japan Echo in August 2003
that the conditions in Iraq differ from those that existed in post-war
Japan. The main question in Iraq will be what to do with the Baath
Party and its neutral elements and their administrative know-how. The
occupation of Japan was well prepared, but according to Makoto, the
policy for pro-American democracy and Western values in Iraq has been
on trial-and-error basis.
But are the values of occupation policies
so called American values?
It is evident that the human rights were
violated both in the wartime Japan and in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. The
occupation of Japan was based on the Allied policy proclaimed in the
Potsdam conference in 1945. After the war the shared values were
pronounced in the United Nations declaration of human rights. The
values, on which the modern democratization campaigns are based on,
are not only western values. On the other hand the US-led coalition is
ensuring its global interests, and on the other hand it is fighting
for the equality, democracy and the basic human rights. In that sense
Japan in 1945 and Iraq in 2003 were in the same sort of situation.
In 1945 the Unites States was aware of
its difficulties such as the lack of Japanese speaking officers and
cultural specialists. The failures in Afghanistan and Iraq have proved
the importance of language skills and cultural knowledge in military
actions as well as in intelligence. In the year 2006 the American
security thinking is changing. The most recent national security
documents point out the need of language skills, knowledge of cultures
and renewed concept of information and its gathering and dissemination.
Takaisin
Studia Historica Septentrionalia 51
|
|
